


Infection

by wintershellraiser



Category: Batman (Movies - Nolan), The Dark Knight
Genre: Animal Transformation, Other, Were-Creatures
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-12 02:02:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29502414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wintershellraiser/pseuds/wintershellraiser
Summary: The Joker gets a nasty infection, but...it's more than that.
Kudos: 1





	Infection

**Author's Note:**

> Part of a small project I've been working on. Common were-creatures are wolves, cats, etc. The Joker was made into a cobra in one animated movie even, but for Ledger's portrayal...I think he would be something else.

A headache pulled him from his unconscious state, J reached up with a paint covered hand and rubbed at his head. The headache split through his sleepiness, pulling at the tendons behind his eyes and throbbing his brain. He sat up slowly, noticing he was missing a glove and his signature purple trench coat. His vest and undershirt torn from what looked like a fight with the Batman, but J did not recall tangling with said bat. He felt a sharp sting on his thigh, his pinstripe pants were dirtied and ripped up, one large gash open where a deep wound seeped out crimson. 

J sat up to look at it better, seeing a rather large, filthy rat tearing off small pieces of flesh from the open wound. He watched it for a few moments, curious and amused watching it try and grab bigger pieces with its filthy teeth. J could see the plague in the rat’s eyes, a sickly, diseased rat was feasting on his sickly, diseased body. He wanted to cackle at the irony, but then again, he didn’t want to scare the rat away. He liked the sharp pain of muscle being torn from muscle, blood oozing out as the small tears formed from the rat’s teeth. Once he grew bored, he pushed the rat away from him with a hiss. J spread the gash open a little more to see how deep it was, seeing tissue split open and deepen the cut. He let out a small giggle, the pain was like a rush from a drug, he craved it. 

The air around him was hazy, like smoke bombs went off nearby. The air has a foul, chemical smell, it has a greenish tint to it as he took time to actually look around. Massive vats with warning symbols on them, toxic and threatening to try to ward off anyone thinking of messing around in the plant. J looked up to the railing where he fell, he saw his trench coat dangling from a loose wire, stuck so it didn’t fall down with him. His dark, sunken eyes narrowed up at it, as if his coat betrayed him and was the one who pushed him down. 

The clown stood, he struggled a little as his leg refused to do what he wanted. He had no choice but to limp pathetically, he growled as he tried to force himself to walk normally but the muscles wouldn’t allow it. Frustrated with his weak limb, he balled his hand so tight the unkept nails punctured crescent moons in his palm, and he hit the open wound with his fist over and over until it numbed. “Bodies are feeble.” He grumbled to himself, “Even when you wanna do somethin…your body stops you. Pathetic…” J continued to stumble a few feet before he felt the sudden urge to throw up. A wave of nausea overwhelmed him, his stomach coiling into knots and almost doubling him over. 

His gloved hand clutched his stomach, it felt as if he were shot. J let out a loud groan and looked over to the vats again, now a visible, but faded, word was spelt on the old cement. ‘Radioactive.’ He felt his throat grow dry, he coughed, breathing made it worse. He growled and clawed at his own throat as he hunched over. Violently coughing into his gloved hand, he failed to notice the blood on the leather, he was too focused on suppressing the urge to puke. J was a man of will, he could make his body hold it in, even if he couldn’t force himself to walk without a limp. His stomach soon began to burn, as if the acid was melting through the protective lining. His muscles were growing tight, all over his body, he felt as if every muscle were contracting at once. 

J wasn’t sure what was happening, at first his mind went to radiation poisoning. He knew it messed your body up, so perhaps that was why he felt like shit. Maybe it was the fall he took, a damaged organ? There was no other possible explanation. As he tried to think, his hands began to cramp severely, enough for him to cringe. “What…” He hissed, looking at his gloved hand, now suddenly feeling constricted in the leather. He watched in bewilderment as his hand stretched the leather painfully before the thick stitching split—his fingers popping and painfully extending, his unkept nails sharpening at the ends. Oh, did it hurt, but J liked a bit of pain, so this was intriguing to see. His hand grew into a slimmer one, longer fingers with sharp claws, the backs of his hand grew thicker hair as he noticed his shirt and vest was growing tight. His other hand slowly mimicked the other, elongating at an excruciatingly slow pace. He could feel every muscle in his hand, every vein, tendon, and bone morph and pop with the new formation. 

His feet gave a similar feeling, his shoes rapidly growing tighter before they burst open like his glove. It was a sharp pain, it burned as he took a few steps, feeling his heel form up violently to be his ankle. He groaned watching himself change, his mind wasn’t working as fast as he wanted. His thinking process was fading, his mind was clouded by the chemicals and adrenaline. J was finding it difficult to connect logic with what was happening, every time he tried to think about why, a new wave of pain would hit him. 

His skin tingled, as if every hair on his body stood at attention, his arms were growing thicker somehow, but as he looked to his shirt, it was growing tighter. He ripped his green vest off with a loud snarl and threw it to the side. He tried to pull his undershirt off but it ripped instead, he wasn’t fast enough as it began to tear right off his body. His arms and chest grew rapidly, the pops and cracks from bones and joints filling his ears. He could hear the rush of fluid in his body as his skeleton morphed. His sternum nearly burst through his chest as his ribcage swelled. The pain was excruciating, it felt as if he had a severe fever, if his body was set aflame, but J didn’t scream. He didn’t yell, he didn’t even fight it. He wasn’t sure what was happening or why, but he was a man to roll with the punches. He found it funny, perhaps the ugly inside him was finally surfacing. He didn’t even consider his scars to be that visual, they didn’t cross his mind at all.

His teeth ached, they felt like someone was pulling them out slowly with rusted pliers. Soon, his mouth was crowded and his face elongated, he could even see his own nose. He groaned and eventually fell to his knees, hands hitting the cold, cemented floor. He crawled as his body began to weaken, to disobey his commands. J crawled to a buzzing light, the sight of his body disappearing as his shadow grew against the stained wall behind him. He began laughing, a maniacal, crazed, uncontrollable laughter. His cackles roared through the old cement, synchronizing with the bubbling of toxic liquid, eventually it descended into something inhuman. Cracks and crunches sounded, the rat feeding on him squeaked, its diseased screech echoed through the plant as J’s shadow transformed into a monster.


End file.
